Love Scars Alt Ending
by sweeety
Summary: An alternate ending for SunsetsandSunrise's Love Scars, with permission from the original author.


The original by SunsetsandSunrise is here s/10753842/1/Love-Scars

Thanks again for letting me write and post this.

Emily is sitting on the floor, bawling her eyes out, watching her black mark fade. It's been three minutes since it started, but the blasted thing never fully went away. She tried rubbing it but it was still there. It was faint but it was there.

One of the firefighters sushes everyone at the scene while this is happening. It's very faint but he swears he hears a heartbeat. It's so, so quiet. Her life so delicate. And everyone is extra careful when they start to move her around.

They give Paige an oxygen mask and ever so gingerly extract her from her vehicle, taking extra care not to jostle her neck and spine. They carry her to the ambulance, and drive her to the hospital, with Spencer at her side, all the while she frenziedly tries to call Emily about a million times.

She paces alongside Paige's gurney, going over what little she knows of Paige's medical history; little facts she discerned over the years, and things she remembered from their years on the same field hockey team. The odd allergy to this-and-that aside, she was the image of health.

* * *

Emily's confounded. Her arm has two scars and something between a scar and a black line now. It's scarring but there's also traces of black interspersed between the cracks in her skin, breaking up the forming scar.

She gazes at her arm almost as if in a trance. That's never happened before.

She picks up her phone and uses it as a torch and puts it right up to her wrist. Yes, it's faint but it's still there. Paige is still there. She turns the phone over in her hand when she feels rather than hears the buzzing which indicates that yet another message has been delivered to her phone.

Turning it over in her hand she reads the popup which shows her a preview of the message she received from Spencer. Despite the message only containing a hospital name and an address, Emily understood immediately what Spencer was trying to convey. She dashed out the door, phone, keys and wallet in one hand, her shoes and Paige's jacket in the other, hailed a passing taxi, and before she finished tying on her shoes, she was already underway to the hospital.

* * *

The waiting was hardest. The uncertainty of it all.

Those were the toughest 36 hours of Emily's life.

The first few, Paige had spent in the emergency room, dying, being resuscitated and dying, over and over and over again. It took three hours to finally stabilize her enough to even consider continuing the operation. Up until then it was all touch and go.

In fact they were so sure she wasn't gonna make it that they even allowed Emily hold her hand a little bit and pay her last respects. But when their hands touched there was that heartbeat again. Faint as a candle light on a winter night. A caress by a rose petal. A butterfly kiss. Faint but present. It was there. It was Paige.

And just as soon as she heard it -the beeping of the heart monitor- she was rushed out, pushed aside by a nurse and a doctor, to the hallway where she could do nothing but watch them administer epinephrine and shout more medical mumbo-jumbo.

Spencer was by her side the whole time, staring dumbfounded at the circus act. An extreme balancing act. Doctors and nurses passing Paige around in their trapeze act. A half turn here and a cardiac arrest there. The absurdity made the whole thing seem like a pantomime.

She put her hands on the curve of Emily's shoulders and tried to redirect her, to keep her from getting fixated but it didn't work. Nothing could sway or move her, she was locked on, on her lips an unspoken prayer or a wish or perhaps a curse.

Eventually an orderly came and forced the two girls out of the area. They had to keep the hallways empty for ease of access after all, and Emily was not doing anybody favours by standing there.

She was pushed all the way to the waiting room, where Spencer guided her to the rest of the gang. Hanna and Aria both had streaks of mascara running down their cheeks, and all three girls immediately wrapped Emily up in a hug the moment they saw her but Emily was unresponsive the entire time she was sat in that waiting room.

She stared off into the distance, lost in her thoughts and calculations and dreams and fears until a doctor appeared out of nowhere again and forwarded a stack of papers her way. Though he was talking she couldn't hear what she was saying. All she could do was look straight ahead, terrified of accidentally glancing down at her wrist and finding the black mark completely gone.

Spencer filled in Paige's admission forms for her, while Hanna wrapped Paige's jacket around her and Aria went for a round of coffee. The warmth and scent emanating from Paige's jacket snapped Emily out of her trance. Suddenly she was awake and lucid and asking all of these questions.

Apparently Paige was stable, though not allowed to have any visitors. These moments were crucial to her survival and at the moment they were preparing to send her into surgery.

There was swelling in her brain and broken bones and other things to deal with. Their main concern was internal bleeding and relieving the pressure. Spencer handed her the consent forms and Emily dotted the i's and ticked all the boxes faster than she'd ever done in her entire life. Every moment was precious now.

She finished filling the paperwork in and stuck it out for the doctor to take. He assured her that the paperwork was a formality and they were not waiting around for her consent to begin, and that the moment they had received verbal confirmation they were able to start the process.

Emily nodded in understanding as she handed over the paperwork, feeling a tiny bit lighter by that knowledge. But the tenseness never went away completely because even though Paige was stable now, she was still in a highly volatile condition.

Spencer wrapped an arm around Emily but she could not stand to be touched. She wriggled out of her embrace, shot up, and started pacing around the waiting room. Nobody had the heart to stop her.

A nurse gave her a shady look but Hanna returned one that was full of venom. The girls sat down trying to get their coffees down, while Emily traced the topographical map of lost loves etched on her arm. There was no way Paige was going to be an additional scar. She would not allow it. She wouldn't bear it.

* * *

3 am now and everything was still.

The girls had managed to fall asleep for the most part. Only Spencer kept herself awake. She saw a nurse approaching but didn't dare arouse the others, she'd need their strength and energy tomorrow.

They would take it in turns for now, to be there for Emily, who needed their presence more than ever before. It was never like this with the girls that came before. There was no waiting. There was no hope. Hope can be a terribly cruel thing. It can breed joy or misery. But it's a risk they were willing to take.

Emily lost so much. This world was such a cruel world. It had taken away so much from one of her dearest friends. She was afraid -genuinely afraid- of what would happen if it took Paige away too. She honestly didn't think she could take it.

That's why she didn't mind her silent vigil. The only other wakeful soul in the wing was Emily. She had given up her pacing hours ago and was now sat by the wall to wall window, staring up at the moon. She didn't know what was going through her mind, but she had never seen the younger girl so silent and so still before.

She hadn't moved from her perch all night and hadn't responded to anybody's questions. She ate nothing and drank nothing, and while a small stack of used disposable coffee cups sat on the coffee table in front of Spencer, three full, cold coffees graced Emily's side.

The nurse hesitated before deciding to speak to Spencer. She told her the surgery seemed to be successful, but that Paige was not out of the woods yet. She would need close monitoring over the next twenty-four hours to determine whether the surgery was truly a success or if they would need to go back in and intervene further.

The odds of success were astronomically low and the odds of Paige making a full recovery were even lower but hope is deaf. Emily however is not and while her body hadn't shifted in any way, the small tear making its way down her cheek, glistening in the moonlight betrayed her.

'please please please please please' she kept repeating like a mantra. She ran out of deities to pray to and now she was imploring the moon. Spencer looked at Aria and Hanna's cat-pile, then back at Emily. She let out a sigh before going for another coffee.

There were 17 disposable coffee cups on the table before her mother and father arrived. They hopped on the first flight over. No one had been in to see Paige yet and no one knew if they would even get another chance to see her alive.

It was a long and arduous wait before anyone was allowed in. But no matter how many hours or coffee cups Emily endured, nothing could have prepared her for this.

To say that the sight was rough would be an egregious understatement. Emily walked into the most sterile room she'd ever remembered being in.

She was given gloves and other protective garments -protective for Paige, not Emily- and she had to scrub her hands thoroughly before she could even be strapped into the protective clothes, as an added measure of protection.

The whole experience was harrowing. Walking in and seeing Paige like that… Machines beeping all around her, drawing little zigzag lines on screens and such. Cables and wires connecting her to the machines and the machines to the wall, almost like a puppet.

There was a shunt in her brain to assist with drainage and some other protrusions she was not allowed to touch. The doctors were very clear about where she was allowed to touch Paige. They laid out a map of her body and circled the spots she was allowed to encroach upon with her skin.

Even though she wanted nothing more than to wrap her arms around her, the directions were very clear and Emily was too scared to even move her feet, terrified that she would trip over them and accidentally cause an accident that would take away her soulmate's life.

So great was her paranoia that she stood in the doorframe for a full minute, with her heart pounding in her chest, before finally gathering the courage and tentatively placing one foot in front of the other and letting go off the wall she was clinging to for life.

As she approached her, a sudden feeling stirred in her stomach. Her heart dropped straight down into it and caused a torrential thunderstorm of epic proportions. She felt sick to her stomach.

The person laying in front of her couldn't have possibly been Paige.

Parts of her face had swollen to such an extreme degree she was barely able to recognize the other girl. Her alabaster skin was covered in blue, yellow, green and purple blotches, looking less like a statue and more like a colour palette someone forgot to rinse out.

Her hair had been shorn off and there were massive incisions all over her body. Some she couldn't even see.

Everywhere she looked there were tiny little cuts and bruises, some of which had a latticework of stitches embroidering them closed. And she couldn't even see her lips for the massive breathing apparatus that was attached to them.

"Paige?" Emily guffawed, and all the tears she'd been holding back were suddenly unleashed as the final barrier broke down and the shock dissipated enough to let her feel everything at full force. She wanted to shriek. To collapse. To pound the walls with her fists. To cry out and grab the other girl by the lapels and shake her. To kiss her back to life. Kiss the colour back on her face. Do something.

But the fear set in and all she could do was stand and watch, feeling every heart beat, every beep of the heart monitor like a little earthquake. Her own heart skipping a beat every time she heard that din in the small, sterile room, her body working in antithesis to Paige's. All she could do was stand there and feel. Every time Paige's heart skipped a beat, she'd look down terrified. But the line was still there, no matter how faint.

Days and weeks passed and Emily stayed by her side.

Weeks after she'd been brought in, Paige remained in her artificial comma. The trauma was too large for her to cope with and the doctors feared she might go into shock so in order for her body and her brain to safely heal they felt the best option was to medically induce a comma.

Emily was encouraged to keep the hope alive and rest her own body, as on survival, the rehabilitation process would be very 'taxing' on her as well, but Emily didn't want to rest. She didn't want to close her eyes at all, afraid of what she'd find there.

Every time she fell asleep she'd wake up screaming. Always the same dream. Completely unoriginal too. Just her, siting by her bedside, holding her hand, talking, then suddenly she feels a squeeze, and immediately searches for Paige's eyes, only by the time she finds them they're glazed over, lifeless, and nurses and doctors surge into the suddenly loud room, pushing her out of the way, tearing Paige's hospital gown open as they begin compressions and charge the defibrillator. Time rushes by until she's left alone in the hospital room, clutching a cold, dead hand, staring at her third scar.

It was twenty one days now and the doctors were looking hopeful. 'Soon' they explained 'she will be able to start focusing and rousing'. So far, everything had been a blur. A flurry of lights and sounds. Nothing could really get through. Waking up was more a process than an action. There'd be moments of clarity eventually but at first, the best she could hope for was for Paige's eyes to track movement.

She saw her eyes again -for the first time since the accident- on a Tuesday. She was sat by Paige's bed, reading her a book when she started to feel warm. She put her book down, fanning herself, and started raising her hoodie over her head.

As she lifted her arms, her perfume wafted over to Paige, the familiar scent causing her to smile. 'Lilacs?' She murmured as best she could. Emily's eyes glued onto her as she started to stir.

"PAIGE!" She called out. Was this really happening or was it another bitter dream?

"Mmm" Paige groaned as she finally managed the Herculean task of opening her eyes.

Emily barely got to see her bloodshot eyes as her own filled up with tears.

She was overcome with emotion. Instincts bade her to cling onto Paige and weep into her shoulder but her apprehension at Paige's current state forbade her. She tentatively stole a kiss before connecting their foreheads together, the palm of her hand cupping Paige's cheek.

"I missed you so much. I was so scared. I thought you were gone."

Paige was too exhausted to speak so she mustered up whatever energy she had and used it to give Emily an Eskimo kiss before resting her head against the pillow again.

Emily smiled through the tears, finally starting to believe everything might actually be alright. The third scar on her arm had almost completely faded, leaving behind a thin black line.


End file.
